Men have dominated the craft of building guideboats ever since the middle of the nineteenth century, when the first guideboats were made. The only known female builder is Allison Warner from Lake Clear.

Warner’s interest in wooden boats dates back to when she paddled wooden canoes while growing up in southern Texas. As a young adult, she moved to the Adirondacks and began working with AmeriCorps as a carpenter’s helper at Great Camp Santanoni under Tupper Lake carpenter Michael Frenette, who introduced her to boat restoration and guideboats in 1999. » Continue Reading.

Building a traditional Adirondack guideboat is a complex task, with ribs carved from spruce-tree roots and with thin hull planks held in place with several thousand tiny tacks. It can take many weeks to complete one.

“I grew up working with wood one way or another, and these are by far the most complex, demanding things, by a long shot, I’ve ever built,” said Rob Davidson, who started building guideboats a few years ago after moving to the Adirondacks from Oregon. » Continue Reading.

An Adirondack Park advocacy group wants the state Department of Environmental Conservation to re-establish a High Peaks Citizen’s Advisory Committee to address increasing usage and resulting impacts to the High Peaks Wilderness.

Adirondack Wild: Friends of the Forest Preserve sent a letter to DEC Region 5 Director Bob Stegemann today, asking for the department to address the surging number of hikers in the High Peaks with a comprehensive approach that includes possible updates to the High Peaks unit management plan. » Continue Reading.

State forest rangers will be turning away motor vehicles from the Adirondack Loj Road on weekends this fall due to an excessive number of hikers and vehicles that have been showing up there.

On busy weekends recently hikers have parked on the Adirondack Loj Road after the Adirondack Mountain Club’s parking lot reached its capacity at 200 vehicles. Now motor vehicles will be turned away after the lot is full. » Continue Reading.

Getting information to visitors of the Adirondack Park has always been a challenge for the state Department of Environmental Conservation. Unlike other state and national parks, the Adirondack Park lacks an entrance facility where visitors can pick up brochures, maps, or other handouts.

In the past, recreational users relied on local visitor centers, guidebooks and maps, guides and outfitters, and word-of-mouth for ideas on where to go and what to do. It took time to plan a trip. That changed with the rise of the internet. Now information can be found in just seconds or minutes from websites and social-media outlets such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. » Continue Reading.

Two trip leaders were ticketed by the state Department of Environmental Conservation Saturday after their group of 67 people drew attention on the trail to Algonquin Peak in the High Peaks Wilderness, according to the DEC. One of the men who says he was one of the leaders now says he is receiving death threats.

A forest ranger charged a 34-year-old Quebec man, who organized the trip, with exceeding the High Peaks Wilderness day-use group-size limit and guiding without a license. A 27-year-old Quebec woman was also charged with guiding without a license. The DEC has not provided the Almanack with the names of those charged in this incident. » Continue Reading.

The Adirondack Forty-Sixers organization has seen a record number of people joining its ranks in recent years. Started in 1925, the club now has 9,425 members—more than a third of whom joined over the last ten years.

The club is open to hikers who have climbed its list of forty-six High Peaks, most of which top four thousand feet. It has seen a record number of new members each year since 2009. Last year, 606 hikers joined. » Continue Reading.

The number of hikers in the High Peaks has been steadily increasing in recent years, especially near Lake Placid and Keene Valley, raising concerns about safety and degradation of natural resources.

“I think that we’ve got a serious overuse of some of our places in the High Peaks,” said Neil Woodworth, executive director of the Adirondack Mountain Club (ADK). “Clearly, Cascade and Pitchoff are just getting a very large number of people.” » Continue Reading.

A Montreal man is using a thru-hike through the High Peaks to raise funds for a local search and rescue organization.

Neil Luckhurst said he plans to start his hike on August 5 in the Dix Mountain Range and continue for 16 days until he finishes up in the Sentinel Mountain Range. Money raised through the trip will go to Lower Adirondack Search and Rescue, which is based in the southern Adirondacks. » Continue Reading.

Two Adirondack organizations have come together to form the Adirondack Loon and Trails Center in Saranac Lake.

The center is combined effort between Biodiversity Research Institute’s Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation and Adirondack Hamlet to Huts, the new initiative to connect trail systems to lodging in communities. The organizations recently had a ribbon-cutting ceremony to announce the center’s opening.

The loon program has been in existence for years under director Nina Schoch, who has operated out of her home in Ray Brook. The program has conducted extensive research projects on mercury and led educational campaigns to protect loons from the dangers of lead fishing tackle, among other things. » Continue Reading.

Adirondack forests could see major changes in the coming decades as a result of forest pests, according to experts who attended a forest pest summit in North Creek recently.

Both the hemlock woolly adelgid and the emerald ash borer have been found south of the Adirondack Park, and the balsam woolly adelgid appears to be causing more damage to balsam firs inside the Blue Line in recent years. » Continue Reading.

The second annual Paddlers Freshet Fest will take place June 10–11 in Saranac Lake. Organized by the Northern Forest Canoe Trail, the festival celebrates the kickoff of the summer paddling season and provides a setting for thru-paddlers—those who have paddled the entire 740-mile trail—to gather.

Already this season, one thru-paddler has completed the trail. John Connelly of Maine finished the long-distance journey on Tuesday. He started on April 16. But he’s not done yet. Connelly is following waterways from Fort Kent, Maine to the Atlantic Ocean, where he will paddle the Maine Island Trail. He hopes to paddle 1,500 miles over 75 days. His trip is dedicated to inspiring other people to get outdoors. » Continue Reading.

The first incident occurred at about 8:30 p.m. on state Route 30, just north of the Meacham Lake Outlet. According to a state Department of Environmental Conservation statement, a female yearling moose was struck by an unknown vehicle.

An environmental conservation police officer and a state police trooper responded to the scene and found the dead moose, according to the DEC. The officers reported seeing an adult moose standing in the nearby wetland. » Continue Reading.

A loon trapped on a golf course in the northern Adirondacks got a helping hand from rescuers last week.

Nina Schoch, director of the Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation, said stormy weather during the night of Sunday, May 15, grounded the bird on the Saranac Inn Golf Club property, which is located northwest of Saranac Lake near the St. Regis Canoe Area. Areas of the northern Adirondacks experienced snow and high winds that night. » Continue Reading.

The Adirondack Park is already experiencing the impacts of climate change. Lakes and ponds are covered with ice for fewer days than they were a century ago; spring is starting earlier in the lower elevations; and storms are becoming more intense and frequent.

Scientists predict that in the future the Park will be a much different place. Wildlife species that can’t adapt to the warmer weather are expected to move northward or to higher elevations. Buildings that remain in floodplains are expected to be more vulnerable to flooding. Plant communities, especially those on high summits and boreal lowlands, could change significantly or even disappear. » Continue Reading.